Kurt Angle has worn Olympic gold around his neck and countless pro wrestling title belts around his waist. The Mt. Lebanon native's latest endeavor has him looking to become a champion in the food industry.

The IOC executive board decided to retain modern pentathlon -- the event considered most at risk -- and remove wrestling instead from its list of 25 "core sports."

Pittsburgh-area high school wrestlers told Channel 4 Action Sports' Justin Rose they're now unsure of their athletic careers after college.

"I think a lot of kids like to wrestle and do it for fun, but for a lot of us, as a little kid, that’s what you dream of being, an Olympic champ. I think it will really devastate the sport,” said Canon-McMillan senior Connor Schram said.

"I think they should have done a huge poll, first off, to see how the fans would react to it, see how the people who don’t usually watch wrestling will react to it," said fellow Canon-McMillan senior Cody Wiercioch.

The IOC board acted after reviewing the 26 sports on the current Olympic program. Eliminating one sport allows the International Olympic Committee to add a new sport to the program later this year.

Wrestling, which combines freestyle and Greco-Roman events, goes back to the inaugural modern Olympics in Athens in 1896.

"This is a process of renewing and renovating the program for the Olympics," IOC spokesman Mark Adams said. "In the view of the executive board, this was the best program for the Olympic Games in 2020. It's not a case of what's wrong with wrestling, it is what's right with the 25 core sports."

Adams said the decision was made by secret ballot over several rounds, with members voting each time on which sport should not be included in the core group. IOC President Jacques Rogge did not vote.

Wrestling was voted out from a final group that also included modern pentathlon, taekwondo and field hockey, officials familiar with the vote told The Associated Press. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the voting details were not made public.

The board voted after reviewing a report by the IOC program commission report that analyzed 39 criteria, including television ratings, ticket sales, anti-doping policy and global participation and popularity. With no official rankings or recommendations contained in the report, the final decision by the 15-member board was also subject to political, emotional and sentimental factors.

Wrestling will now join seven other sports in applying for inclusion in 2020. The others are a combined bid from baseball and softball, karate, squash, roller sports, sport climbing, wakeboarding and wushu. They will be vying for a single opening in 2020.

The IOC executive board will meet in May in St. Petersburg, Russia, to decide which sport or sports to propose for 2020 inclusion. It is extremely unlikely that wrestling would be voted back in so soon after being removed by the executive board.